Stanford Article: Seeing at the Speed of Sound

I love “Seeing at the Speed of Sound,” a long article by Rachel Kolb that could’ve very well been written by me. I can relate to dealing with mumblers, people with accents, spy comments, darkness and encounters with the deaf community.

Not only is it hard to lipread mumblers and people with accent, but others as she lists them. “People with thin lips; people who mumble; people who speak from the back of their throats; people with dead-fish, unexpressive faces; people who talk too fast; people who laugh a lot; tired people who slur their words; children with high, babyish voices; men with moustaches or beards; people with any sort of accent.”

My older son, 15 years old, wears his hair long. And it gets to the point where his bangs cover his eyes. I can’t talk to him like that. It feels like a barrier to communication even though it has nothing to do with his lips. Like Kolb says, people with unexpressive faces are harder to understand. So not being able to see his eyes is probably part of that.